‘Behind the Palm Trees’ Director Meryem Benm’barek Refuses to Compromise: ‘I Needed to Maintain Absolute Creative Freedom’

“Behind the Palm Trees” director Meryem Benm’barek is navigating a swirl of emotions as her film prepares for its world premiere at the Marrakech Film Festival.

On the one hand, the Moroccan auteur — whose feature debut “Sofia” was acclaimed in Un Certain Regard in 2018 — is deeply moved to unveil her latest work in her home country.

“I know my film will be received here on a very deep level,” she tells Variety.

At the same time, that joy crowns years of struggle to bring the project to life. “Making this film was very hard,” she says. “For seven years I went through moments of real despair, but I never gave up. Above all, I held onto my vision, even though the process was extraordinarily complicated and the film was made under very difficult economic conditions.”

Unlike her 2018 breakout, “Behind the Palm Trees” did not benefit from key public mechanisms that often prove essential for projects of this scale. The absence of French institutional support was particularly striking for a film featuring well-known performers such as Carole Bouquet and Olivier Rabourdin.

“It says something about how difficult it is for France today to look at the consequences of its colonial past straight in the eye in order to repair certain things,” Benm’barek reflects. “It’s also hard, I think, for many French people to accept the position they still occupy in many countries, particularly in Africa.”

Instead, the film came together through a patchwork of international and local solidarity. “The film existed thanks to the support of England, Morocco and Belgium, but also thanks to a collective momentum from the Tangier community, which fully rallied around the project,” she says. “I’m lucky to have many friends in Tangier who helped me. It truly became a collective effort for the film to exist. We lacked money, but we didn’t give up.”

Crucially, she adds, her creative autonomy was never compromised. “My producers never once asked me to make artistic concessions [especially around the frank depictions of sexuality, which made the project challenging in certain territories],” she continues. “Unfortunately, given the state of the film industry today, directors often have to compromise — sometimes even during the writing process. But I can say that this film fully reflects my vision of the world. Every line of dialogue, every shot, every camera move was thought through and carefully chosen. That makes all the difference; I left absolutely nothing to chance.”

Indeed, it would be nearly impossible to erase all traces of sexuality from an intimate thriller centered on a young man from Tangier torn between two starkly different romantic partners. While young contractor Mehdi (Driss Ramdi) is already half-engaged to Selma (Nadia Kounda), a socially reserved bakery worker, he soon finds himself drawn to the sexually liberated Marie (Sara Giraudeau) — an affluent Frenchwoman who begins as a client before becoming his lover and social benefactor, fueling his fantasies of upward mobility and a different life.

“I needed to maintain absolute creative freedom,” Benm’barek explains. “Marie gives access to her body — and it was important that this could be seen, since the story is experienced through Mehdi’s gaze. Selma, by contrast, is defined by modesty; she doesn’t reveal herself and denies access to her body. The intimate scenes therefore required a different visual language. These were deliberate choices, reflecting my artistic vision and the direction I wanted for the film, even if they may not resonate with everyone.”

Films like “Dirty Dancing” and “Titanic” resonated with Benm’barek as she developed her latest feature, inspiring her to blend sharp social commentary with a compelling, accessible narrative.

“‘Dirty Dancing’ was so far ahead of its time,” she says. “It deals with abortion, class divisions, the emancipation of a young girl becoming a woman and freeing herself from her father. [And ‘Titanic,’ like many films] follow a character moving from one social class to another.”

“I was raised on 90s thrillers and those slightly cheesy TV movies on Saturday nights,” she continues. “I make the kinds of films I would’ve loved as a spectator. I don’t think we should overthink everything. Pleasure has to stay at the center, because making films is hard — and it’s only getting harder.”

“Ours is a job full of doubt, where nothing is ever really easy,” she says. “So it’s important to hold on to that place of pleasure, to remember what made us want to create films in the first place. We were spectators before anything else, and we were moved by films. That sense of pleasure is essential — otherwise, it just becomes too hard to keep going.”